When it launched in 2004, Electric Picnic was a one-day affair. Co-founders, the late John Reynolds and Robbie Butler, hoped to shift 15,000 tickets, but on the day around 10,000 punters showed up. There was no official camping.
.. although people camped in the field designated for parking.
The following year, it grew to a two-day event and to three days in 2006. By then, it had redefined what an Irish festival was all about. For almost a decade attendances hovered around 30,000, but this weekend 75,000 picknickers will enjoy the festival.
The arts and music carnival — with its offbeat attractions, from a 24-hour cinema to mock weddings in an inflatable church — has had some memorable moments: Arcade Fire’s frontman Win Butler seeing “grown men crying” at their gig in 2005; David Best’s spectacular Temple of Truth going up in flames in 2008; and a moment that never was — Rage Against the Machine in 2021, when the festival was cancelled last-minute for the second year running because of the covid pandemic. Here, some event veterans and regulars recall some of their favourite memories through the decades. Stevie G, DJ and broadcaster The first Electric Picnic in 2004 was a very different thing.
It was the brainchild of John Reynolds. His business partner Robbie Butler booked me for a VIP lounge that year; it wasn’t a proper gig. As a new festival, it was a hard sell even though the acts were good.
They got on to me — because I was working in Red FM — and said 'Will you give away 60 or 100 tickets to hype it up?'. The night before Electric Picnic, I was in a bar in Cork, The Agora, DJing a hip hop night, giving Picnic tickets away for free. When you think of it now — how much a ticket is worth.
A bunch of us travelled up from Cork the next day. It was boiling hot. There was some mishap at the gate.
I couldn’t get in. I was standing outside with two massive boxes of records for about an hour and a half, having given away tickets to half of Cork! John Reynolds happened to be going by in a buggy. I told him what happened.
He said: 'Don’t mind that. Come with me'. He brought me up in the buggy to one of the big stages.
Their DJ, Nu-Mark from Jurassic 5, was late, stuck on the motorway. Suddenly I went from not getting into the festival to playing for two hours in a tent full of a few thousand people. My friends, there to see Nu-Mark, were going: 'What’s yer man doing up there?!' Jarlath Regan, comedian "I’ve been going down to Electric Picnic, pretty early doors.
The memory that sticks out is Beastie Boys in 2007. People remember them going out and saying 'Hello, Dublin'. Part of me thought it was a joke because of the wit of the boys.
I’m a mad Beastie Boys fan all my life. They’re brats, never up to good. At the gig, my wife and I were standing at the side of the stage with dozens of other artists and people.
Jarvis Cocker was standing next to us. My wife was getting more and more tired, and she leaned on a travel case in front of her. She tried to reach around, to see if she could lean forward, and at that moment a woman stood up and said to her 'Can you take your hands out of my pants?'.
What she thought was a travel case was another woman’s backside. My wife turned to me and said 'We have to go now. We're going now!' I'm looking at her.
Jarvis Cocker is looking at me. I'm looking back at her and looking at the Beastie Boys and going 'Why? What happened?'. She said 'I can explain later'.
I said 'The Beastie Boys are on stage. I'm physically not able to leave'. At that moment, somebody wearing a big security jacket came over and said 'There's too many people here side of stage'.
So we all got kicked out, including Jarvis." Hugo Jellett, Co-cirector, Salty Dog, Trailer Park, etc My wife Roz and I have worked together on Electric Picnic since the start when there was just bits of bunting on the lawn. No one had done anything like what John Reynolds was trying to imagine that year.
Everyone realised he was doing something special — breaking the mould of the traditional clear-span, beer tent, big stage and then everyone goes home festival. It wasn't about the urgency of the lineup. It was about the memories you made from the experience of being at a festival.
Of course, everyone is thrilled when the line-up is announced but Electric Picnic revellers mostly return because of the silly stuff that goes on in the woods, bunkers, shipwrecks, plane crashes, trailer parks. A great memory is Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros getting lost trying to find their way to do a secret gig on the Salty Dog stage in lashing rain and the stage wasn't as waterproof as it might have been. They just played through it.
It was a thing of real beauty. I remember Seasick Steve requested three bottles of cheap red wine on his Salty Dog stage rider. We got him some quite nice wine because he’s Seasick Steve.
We presented our quite nice wine to him, and he went: "No. I don't want that. I asked for cheap wine.
I don't want good wine. Otherwise, I'm gonna get a taste for good wine and then I'll be at it for the rest of my life." Naoise Nunn, director, Mindfield I managed Après Match on the comedy stage at the first Electric Picnic in 2004.
It was absolutely stinking hot. The three lads wore shorts under the desk; and on top they had the shirt, tie and suits. I was at the famous, brilliant Arcade Fire gig in 2005.
It was in a tent. I didn't really know them beforehand. It was that rare time at a gig when you got the sense something special was happening.
There was real electricity in the air. We started Mindfield in 2006. We were at the edge of the Body & Soul area.
There was camping right up to the back of our tent. I remember David McWilliams chairing a debate when a tent flap at the back of the stage half opened and a lad peeked in. David pulled the flap back and he was pissing up against the back of the tent.
David immediately quipped, quoting Lyndon B Johnson: “Always better to be inside the tent pissing out than outside the tent pissing in.” We had Channel 4 newsman Jon Snow on the Mindfield stage in 2009. Well-known musicians and personalities queued up to get their photo taken with him.
Before arriving, he went to Dunnes to get Wellington boots for the muddy conditions underfoot, but they were sold out except for two left-foot wellies, which he bought — and displayed gleefully on stage with his feet stuck out to the audience. Barry Murphy, Hermitage Green My first Electric Picnic was 2010. We started playing at it from 2012.
There's something for every moment of the day. When you're tired and need a lift, there’s a different experience around every corner like, say, Toots and the Maytals playing Sunday afternoon on the Main Stage in 2016. I love my bit of reggae, getting you into that vibe at that time.
My earliest memory of the Picnic is Mumford & Sons. I met them at the festival and was chatting. They said 'Do you want to come up on stage with us?'.
They were due to do the Main Stage 20 minutes later. So we jumped in a golf cart, drove to back stage. I couldn't believe how cool they were, no warm ups, just straight on stage and the place went bananas and they were calling us up on stage.
I wasn’t even in Hermitage Green at that point. It was pure scallywag carry-on! My favourite gig was Noel Gallagher playing the Main Stage, watching it with my mates from school, listening to him, getting through his Flying Birds stuff, and then playing all the Oasis classics. It was incredible.
Sharon Murphy, Dublin Gospel Choir "The Dublin Gospel Choir started singing at Electric Picnic in 2005 and we sang there until 2022. We had the same time slot every year — the first gig Sunday morning on the Main Stage. The best bit was people coming up 'I was here last year.
I got up this morning dying, but I'm here. This is the hangover healing service'. I love the characters you’d see.
People really dressed up. We had people coming to see us from churches there to see gospel music on a Sunday morning. Then you had way-out-there hippies dressed up as fairies.
People came up in their pyjamas or little onesies. You can go to the festival just to watch the fashion." Tracy Clifford, DJ and broadcaster I’ve so many great memories of Electric Picnic.
Every time I've seen Underworld play there, I’ve loved it — everybody dancing together, enjoying it in unison. The Chemical Brothers closing out Saturday night in 2007 was a great night. I interviewed Rick Astley last year.
He was unbelievable. When Body & Soul was in the middle of Electric Picnic it was the best. I loved the little amphitheatre on the hill.
I remember Le Boom play there around 2016, playing drums with bottles. They were so, so good. Body & Soul was beautiful in the sun.
You could sit there, maybe on Saturday afternoon, soaking things up. A beautiful gig by the fiddler Martin Hayes stands out. By the time Sunday came around, there might have been a bit of rain, with people just sliding down the amphitheatre.
Electric Picnic is like a playground for adults. Anything goes. Obviously you see the dregs when you camp.
I remember waking up one morning, dying for water. There was a hum of activity — I could hear everything happening in neighbouring tents. I opened my tent to breathe and I heard this guy saying 'Mate, mate, come back! I’m so sorry.
I didn't know she was your mam!'..
